Gary Johnson vetoed 750 bills while Governor of New Mexico. He was reelected overwhelmingly as the popluar Governor Veto. He vetoed more bills than all the governors of the other 49 states combined during the same 8 years. Almost none of his vetoes were overridden - even bills that originally passed with more than the required vote to override, were not overridden by the legislature after Johnson vetoed them.

Absolutely correct. Imprisoning people for victimless crimes is monstrous and it has to stop.

I agree. While I do think that Johnson doesn't stand a chance, and do disagree with many of his other positions, this one is major. I think the best thing to do is to make it an issue where mainstream politicians lose more votes for supporting drug laws than they do for arguing against them. With the changing demographics, this seems possible in the not too distant future. I think that politicians should be constantly reminded that many people are against the drug laws.

Not sure that this is even worth the time to do, but every few months I go to the petition page on the white house site, and "sign" the ones that are worthwhile.

Votes matter to politicians, so if enough people make this a big enough issue, it might eventually change.

So are you going to vote for the Republican who favors the current drug laws, or the Democrat who favors the current drug laws?

Or the Libertarian who won't win, and whose economic platform I disagree with? Anyways, even if you vote for the libertarian candidate, it isn't enough, there should be a dual strategy to let all politicians know that if they want to be politically viable in the future they should change their positions. If you look at the gay marriage/rights thing, ignoring any arguments about whether the state should be involved or not, they accomplished that through constant pressure. Politicians change according to popular opinion all the time.

Votes matter to politicians, so if enough people make this a big enough issue, it might eventually change.

So are you going to vote for the Republican who favors the current drug laws, or the Democrat who favors the current drug laws?

Or the Libertarian who won't win, and whose economic platform I disagree with? Anyways, even if you vote for the libertarian candidate, it isn't enough, there should be a dual strategy to let all politicians know that if they want to be politically viable in the future they should change their positions. If you look at the gay marriage/rights thing, ignoring any arguments about whether the state should be involved or not, they accomplished that through constant pressure. Politicians change according to popular opinion all the time.

Leon, Johnson's platform issue is legalizing marijuana. You're right, he won't win the Presidency. So why do you care about his other economic positions? Like other third-party candidates before him, he's running on an issue, not for the Presidency. And he's doing better than a lot of other third-party candidates. He probably won't win as many votes as Ross Perot, but look at how Perot made deficit reduction a popular issue.

Where do you vote Leon? Do you vote from a swing state? If you don't vote from a swing state, and you support liberalization of marijuana policy, then political calculus dictates your most efficient vote would be for Gary Johnson.

But if you vote from Ohio or Florida (or Colorado or New Hampshire or a handful of other states), go ahead and ignore my advice.

Even if by some act of God he became POTUS the various lobbies would grind him up. To be precise, the congressmen funded by lobbies would not act

Only a very strong leader will be able to end things like the drug war or the empire. Ending a legislative decision is not about a strong leader; it's about a legislature willing to do so.

Liberal democracy is mobs of drooling masses passionately voting to support the system imposed on them by the elite. The only way to meaningfully change the system is to change the elite.

The elite will always be there. Better government would most likely occur by limiting influence. I'm not talking states rights pap. The size of the House of Representatives should expand as it was intended.

Libertarians aren't psychologically there yet. Beltway libertarians like Johnson would only make things worse.

Libertarians are just a 3rd party. Our system doesn't support third parties. The way forward is reforming the two parties from within.

The proof is in the history. The only successful 3rd party ever were the republicans when the Whigs died. It's still hard to call even that a shift to a new party considering the Republicans were half-whig anyway. Suppose the Tea Party ascends. That would mean the Republicans died, but the Tea Party is just another name for a species of republican.

Which brings us back to Gary Johnson.

He's weak and has no congressional base for any of the polyanna he might represent.

Votes matter to politicians, so if enough people make this a big enough issue, it might eventually change.

So are you going to vote for the Republican who favors the current drug laws, or the Democrat who favors the current drug laws?

Or the Libertarian who won't win, and whose economic platform I disagree with? Anyways, even if you vote for the libertarian candidate, it isn't enough, there should be a dual strategy to let all politicians know that if they want to be politically viable in the future they should change their positions. If you look at the gay marriage/rights thing, ignoring any arguments about whether the state should be involved or not, they accomplished that through constant pressure. Politicians change according to popular opinion all the time.

Leon, Johnson's platform issue is legalizing marijuana. You're right, he won't win the Presidency. So why do you care about his other economic positions? Like other third-party candidates before him, he's running on an issue, not for the Presidency. And he's doing better than a lot of other third-party candidates. He probably won't win as many votes as Ross Perot, but look at how Perot made deficit reduction a popular issue.

Where do you vote Leon? Do you vote from a swing state? If you don't vote from a swing state, and you support liberalization of marijuana policy, then political calculus dictates your most efficient vote would be for Gary Johnson.

But if you vote from Ohio or Florida (or Colorado or New Hampshire or a handful of other states), go ahead and ignore my advice.

I vote in North Carolina. It's not normally a swing state, but given the results during the last presidential election, I think it qualifies as one this time around. I have very many problems with Obama, so I won't be voting for him, but will be voting very strongly against Mitt's foreign policy, where I do think there is a clear difference between the candidates. My calculation is that Mitt is much more likely to get us involved in another war, and I care more about that issue right now than the Marijuana one.

Only a very strong leader will be able to end things like the drug war or the empire. Ending a legislative decision is not about a strong leader; it's about a legislature willing to do so.

In the case of both Federal drug enforcement and military deployment, this is 100% wrong.

On drug enforcement:
Leadership positions of the DoJ and DEA serve at the pleasure of the President. If they want to keep their jobs, they do exactly what the President wants. If an end to Federal marijuana law enforcement is what the President wants, it's what he gets. Also, the President has the authority to pardon any Federal convicts he sees fit. This could certainly apply to any victims of marijuana laws.

On military deployment:
As commander-in-chief, the President does what he wants. As long as he doesn't start sending troops into battle without Congressional approval (which is widely accepted these days anyway) he can move troops and close bases anywhere he likes.

I don't really have an opinion about Gary Johnson or the Libertarian Party other than Johnson seems like a good guy.

But, I do want to say something about political parties in the U.S.

The Democrats and the Republicans do not stand for liberals and conservatives nor are they monolith parties. The Democrats and the Repubicans only stand for the Democrats and the Republicans. It is up to individual candidates (and technically the people who vote for them though I think there is some disconnect here) and the platforms they choose. What parties stand for in the U.S. is actually surprisingly elastic. It could be anything.

I think this is one reason (and a big reason) why 3rd parites have rarely done well in the U.S. The Republicans are the only long term 3rd party to ever crash the gate. And, think about how divided the country was at that time to have such an opening.

In some sense, there is no reason to have a 3rd party in the U.S. If you do not like the direction of a political party, all you have to do is either run a different candidate in the primaries and/or lobby the existing candidates to change their policies.

Ron Paul has this one right. There is no reason to run as a Libertarian. It is a waste of time and money. It is better to run as a Republican or a Democrat and try to change either the tone of the election or win the nomination and change the party that way.

At best, 3rd parties can be a spoiler, such as Ross Perot in the 1992 election. At worst, you just throw your vote away.

Chances are votes for Libertarians are not votes for Romney. Maybe, a small handful would vote for Obama but I bet it is a small few. If it were more than maybe Paul runs in the Democratic primary, I don't know.

Regardless of the details, the reality is that is how political parties work in the U.S. There are no liberal or conservative or environmental or fascist or socialist or natural law or whatever parties of any substance in the U.S. because the system doesn't work that way.

There are two parties. They stand for nothing. Within certain limits, anyone can run for a party position and anyone can vote (within certain limits state by state). The candidates (with the support of the electorate) decide what they stand for. Of course, candidates can be lobbied (sp?). In this way, various other positions as stated in the above paragraph find their way into party platforms, policy papers, real legislation and actual policies.

The people and so-called 3rd parties playing at the fringes mean nothing.

You want something done, make it known where the real action is taking place - in the Democratic or Republican party.

All politics is local. You want to make a difference. Start in your communities. They are small or relatively small, in need of leadership and open to people who have an interest. From there, you can work up the system. It takes effort. It always does. Sitting around complaining about it does nothing. But, you can change things. It happens all the time. It is just rarely by the we want a positive change crowd. They'd rather b!tch and moan than govern.

In some sense, there is no reason to have a 3rd party in the U.S. If you do not like the direction of a political party, all you have to do is either run a different candidate in the primaries and/or lobby the existing candidates to change their policies.

Take it a step further: there is no reason to have political parties full stop in the United States. Our system would operate much more reasonably and effectively if it didn't involve the tribal emotions intrinsic to party-based politics. Just think of how much of politics revolves around trying to make the other party look bad (often at the expense of actual results), and then imagine how much better things would be without that. Sure, you'd have to actually research your candidate a bit to get to know what they stood for, but if anything, that's part of the appeal.

Interesting thought. How do you get there though? A constitutional ban from forming political parties? Could legislaters talk with other legislatures outside the legislature to discuss legislation? Or you just talking about removing the labels when you vote but otherwise elected officials could talk and support each other as they wanted?